Jag brukar delta i en månatlig tävling som heter Furious Fiction Friday, och även om jag aldrig har vunnit så har jag lyckats komma med på långlistan två gånger. Engelska är kanske inte populärt här, men här har ni i alla fall den ena av de två berättelserna:
[Ingen titel]
Aiva’s doing the rounds. She can, now. Being near the edge used to terrify her, but so many years have passed, with so little to do, that even the threat of the outside is a welcome break from monotony.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” a perky voice announces through every loudspeaker in the Circle, “the winner of this year’s explorer suit raffle will be drawn shortly! Please make your way to the main stage!”
Exciting stuff...
Every year, the Circle turns into a fairground for the raffle, and every year, the prize is an explorer suit, which means that every year, the winner tries to decline. Some have quietly returned theirs to Explorer Cord, while others simply hide theirs until friends and family forget they have it.
“Aiva!”
She turns around and sees her little brother standing some fifty metres away, which is the closest he’s ever been – at thirty-eight years of age, he still acts like a fidgety child at the mere thought of the outside.
Everyone’s a child.
Aiva sighs, and hopes the other security guards aren’t looking as she runs over to him.
“What?”
“I forgot my ticket!” he says, crestfallen.
Without a word, she reaches into the pocket of her pressed trousers, pulls out her ticket, and hands it to him before hurrying back.
Is she disappointed? No. Maybe. She hasn’t made plans or anything, but it would be nice to own a suit, just in case – just to know that, at any point, she could fling open the doors to the unknown. Because you don’t ask to borrow someone else’s suit. You just don’t.
Explorer Cord takes the stage, and gives them the latest version of the same speech he gives every year: how important it is to not give up, how he never gave up until he found the Circle, how he went back for all of them and brought them here, how he’ll never stop hoping that there’s something left out there, how they need to keep looking no matter what, bla bla bla.
Just a few years ago, this was enough for her to stay inside. The echoes of the loudspeakers, paired with the brightness of the streetlights which, at night, make the nothing beyond really seem like nothing, made her feel like a target. Now, being a target is better than being, well,
nothing, and she almost feels a kinship with the outside.
Ignoring what her colleagues might say, she stops, and thinks how strange it is that this railing, no higher than her waist, is the only barrier between them and nothing. And it’s never talked about – everyone knows not to ask Explorer Cord about it – but Aiva’s begun to wonder why the outside has land, with trees rustling in the wind, if there’s no land or trees or wind.
Way out in the nothing, families pack up their picnics for the day.
“...screw it.”
Aiva climbs over the railing.
Lands on grass just like inside the Circle.
And starts running.
